Digital Commons Network^™

Multi-Method Assessment Of Newcomer Settlement Experiences In Kitchener-Waterloo, Qaseem Ludin

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Every day hundreds of newcomers begin a new life in Canada. Some are refugees fleeing persecution, others come to join family, and yet others (mostly the economic and independent categories) are seeking to make a better life for themselves. In all, since 2000 around 250,000 people have settled in Canada each year. Their backgrounds and personal histories may be widely different and each one’s experience on arrival is unique. The communities across Canada into which they integrate differ too in their character and in the manner in which they receive newcomers. For many new Canadians, there are, nevertheless, certain shared …

Effective Teaching & Teaching Evaluation Practices: Canadian University Geography Departments, Susan Vajoczki

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In this thesis teaching evaluation practices in Canadian university geography departments are examined. The objective of this research is to identify good practices for teaching evaluation that can be applied within geography departments at Canadian universities and may be applicable to other departments and within other countries. In order to meet this goal a number of research questions were identified. These include:

1. What is effective teaching in higher education?;
2. What is effective teaching within the discipline of geography in higher education?;
3. How and why is teaching evaluated in higher education?;
4. What is the breadth of teaching evaluation practices currently used …

Diminished Access, Diverted Exclusion: Women And Land Tenure In Sub-Saharan Africa, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

Increasing commercialization, population growth and concurrent increases in land value have affected women's land rights in Africa. Most of the literature concentrates on how these changes have led to an erosion of women's rights. This paper examines some of the processes by which women's rights to land are diminishing. First, we examine cases where rights previously utilized have become less important; that is, the incidence of exercising rights has decreased. Second, we investigate how women's rights to land decrease as the public meanings underlying the social interpretation and enforcement of rights are manipulated. Third, we examine women's diminishing access to …

Geography: 1983-2007, Paul E. Todhunter

UND Departmental Histories

This departmental history was written on the occasion of the UND Quasquicentennial in 2008.

Land Tenure And Rental In Western Sudan, Michael Kevane, Leslie C. Gray

Economics

This paper reports on aspects of land tenure in western Sudan, especially the nature of tenure insecurity and the functioning of the land rental market. The active land rental market accounted for about one-third of cultivated land. Patterns of land rental transactions, and tests of the importance of insecurity in renting land, where the owner may not be able to reclaim land rented out, do not support the presumption that rental markets perform poorly. The role of the sheikh as administrator of village land, and the claims of large landowners to vast tracts, are, however, important political problems that must …

Dwelling, Walking, Serving: Organic Preservation Along The Camino De Santiago Pilgrimage Landscape, Mercedes Chamberlain Quesada-Embid

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

This study is an exploration of the people and the landscape of the well-known Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route. Although there are many routes that make up the entirety of the pilgrimage, this research is specifically focused on the landscape of the Camino Francés, or French Route, in northern Spain. The path has been written about in many ways and for a myriad of reasons since it became affiliated with the Christian tradition in the early ninth century. This research, however, is different. By way of an environmental history and hermeneutic approach, an investigation of the interrelated and overlapping human …

The Ecology Of Paradox: Disturbance And Restoration In Land And Soul, Rowland S. Russell

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

This heuristic study explores environmental disturbance and ecological restoration in several North American settings in order to uncover epistemological, philosophical, aesthetic and ethical considerations revolving around those place-based processes. With fire as one of the central metaphors of this work, the initial place-based chapter examines Northern New Mexico's Pajarito Plateau to explore the region's fire ecology. The study then moves to the Pacific Northwest to draw restoration practice that attempt to restore wild salmon to urban Seattle habitat. The third place-based chapter focuses on the Midwest grass and farmlands in order to investigate the seeming contradictions between commodity and diversity …

The Human Activity-Travel Rescheduling Decision Process, Andrew F. Clark

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Over the past few decades the activity scheduling decision process has become an important topic for transportation researchers, including how people reschedule their daily activities and travel in reaction to change. Rescheduling decisions include modifications/updates to timing, location/route, involved persons, event/mode type, and other attributes of activities/trips, as well as addition and deletion of completely new events. Such decisions occur as part of an ongoing process over time, space and across individuals. This thesis developed and applied a new data collection methodology for exploring the rescheduling decision process. The methodology had four main stages: capturing preplanned schedules; Global Positioning System …

Assessing The ‘Hazards Of Place’ Model Of Vulnerability: A Case Study Of Waterloo Region, Erin Joakim

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This research project examines the Hazards of Place model of vulnerability (as developed by Cutter, 1996) to determine whether it is applicable in a Canadian context.

An in-depth case study of the Regional Municipality of Waterloo was used to determine whether the model accurately describes:

1. emergency and community practitioners understandings of vulnerability and vulnerable populations in Waterloo Region
2. emergency and community practitioners perceptions of the variables that influence vulnerabilities
3. mitigation and preparedness efforts that could be enhanced and/or implemented to reduce the vulnerability of individuals and groups in Waterloo Region

To complete this study, in-depth interviews and surveys were conducted …

Intra-Urban Analysis Of Commercial Locations: A Gis-Based Approach, Christopher D. Storie

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The urban landscape is an interspersed mixing of residences, shops, theaters, parks, natural areas, and a multitude of other uses. From the early days of the central markets, to the planned downtown, to the heavily planned super-regional shopping complexes, commercial landscapes evolve. There has been considerable research conducted on analyzing the commercial structure of urban environments in an attempt to better understanding the nature of retailing and its resultant impacts on the geography of the city.

This research has three broad goals: a) to develop a technique that makes operational, in a systematized and objective manner, an approach to analyzing …

Hydrological Response Patterns And Solute Flux In Canadian Shield Basins: Role Of Different Physical Features And Antecedent Moisture Conditions, Jessica Mueller

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Patterns of stream flow in relatively undisturbed Canadian Shield basins are closely linked to their physical and vegetative characteristics and meteorological conditions. The physical characteristics include topography, soil-till composition, depth and structure, slope morphology and bedrock geology. Hydrological flowpaths through, and in-situ chemical processes in the soil-till matrix are influenced greatly by the composition of these features and by the antecedent hydrological conditions preceding a given storm or snowmelt event.

A long term data set, collected by the Dorset Environmental Science Centre, is used to examine eight forested basins within the Muskoka-Haliburton region of south-central Ontario. The basins have a …

Overcoming Global Ignorance: Developing Geographic Literacy In A World Regional Geography Course, Amy Seymour

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The most recent Roper Survey (2006), a study of geographic literacy among 18-to 24-year-olds, found that despite constant coverage of the war in Iraq since 2003, 63% of Americans surveyed could not find Iraq on a map. Similar shortcomings abound in the poll, pointing to what must be considered a "geographic illiteracy" among Americans. This national geographic illiteracy has global implications that range from the local to the global scale, including issues of politics, economics, foreign policy, environmental policy, and resource use to name just a few. How badly prepared, then, are students entering colleges and universities in terms of …

Session 7 - A Comparative Geographic Analysis Of The Impact Of Scale On Hazards And Vulnerability In Industrialized Continental Lands And Small Pacific Islands, William J. Smith Jr.

International Symposium on Technology and Society

Geography, specifically scale, has significant impacts in terms of hazards and vulnerability. Small islands, such as those found in the Pacific, experience the impacts of their relatively unique geography and scale in terms of hazards and vulnerability in at least five ways: 1) Perception and communication; 2) Impact and escape from impact; 3) Technology; 4) Recovery; and 5) Socio-environmental justice. Comparative analysis in these five areas between the Pacific’s small islands and industrialized continental regions illuminates differences regarding the way hazards and vulnerability should be conceptualized in the under-treated small islands of the world. Lessons from this analysis will aid …

Deep Ecology And Postmodernity: Making Space For Conversation, Chris Drinkwater

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[Fourth paragraph]

I begin with the fact of ecology's virtual exclusion from cultural studies. Cultural studies are centrally concerned with issues of meaning, subjectivity, objectivity and knowledge. They attempt to describe their production, conditions and complex structural effects. They are particularly interested in effects of inclusion and exclusion: for instance, "What is a legitimate object of attention within a particular discourse?" Why do cultural studies not attend to ecology? Why is negligible attention paid to a discourse and cultural movement, which are so challenging to dominant values and ways of life? I suggest that the omission is not accidental. Cultural …

Early Days In The Green Movement: A Personal Account, Rosemarie Rowley

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

From someone who from an early age had wanted to be a poet, and whose favourite poet was Wordsworth, it is not difficult to imagine that in some way I would relate to nature as a mature woman. For me it was not the difficulty of being a woman poet which offered the greatest challenge, since my father, a traditional musician, and my aunt who was a songwriter in America had encouraged me to write poetry, but the difficulty was of combining political activism with poetry.

Introduction, Alexandra Ganser, Vibha Arora

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

At the time of finalizing EcoCultures for publication, nearly all discussions in mass media remind us that climate change has been caused by anthropogenic excesses in the last three centuries. Environmental concern, intertwined with a critical and scholarly perspective, is also at the heart of EcoCultures: Culture Studies and the Environment. The twelve academic articles comprising this issue were written by scholars based in the North and South, speaking different languages yet living in a multicultural global world, and positioned in disciplines ranging from landscape and environmental history, literature and gender studies to visual studies and art. …

Women Of The New Walden: Gender In Sound Culture, Now And Then, Phylis Johnson

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

Sonic diversity in the midst of wilderness, as original and untamed, can confound and discomfort the novice listener who becomes overwhelmed by its plethora of mysterious languages. Transcendentalist Margaret Fuller, author of Summer on the Lakes (1844), expressed sensory overload when she was confronted with the sights and sounds of Niagara Falls. Sound permeates our life, from conception, birth, and varied sonic spheres of influence that penetrate our physical space. Sound acknowledges its relevance as a cultural influence within the socialization of the individual. For instance, high-powered car stereos and subwoofers swimming in bass overtones have become associated with masculinity. …

Gestures Toward Cross-Species Reciprocal Relations In Contemporary Poetics, Mary Newell

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

In this essay, I explore some embodied bases of ethical attitudes toward human/ animal exchanges in the texts of three contemporary authors: Mary Oliver, Heller Levinson, and Adrienne Rich. Since other species share with humans varieties of agency, sentience, and purposive activity, I suggest that reciprocity is a fundamental aim in cross-species relations. Phenomenological philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty depicts the correlation between embodied actions and attitudes, for example, between the hand movement of grasping and an appropriative attitude toward the natural world. His concept of reciprocity, grounded in the experience of one hand touching another, provides a reference for encounters that …

Translating Ecocriticism: Dialoguing With Michel Serres, Stephanie Posthumus

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

Since its humble beginnings in the Western United States, ecocriticism has grown under the banner of the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment into an organization of over 1000 members with international affiliates in Australia-New Zealand, Canada, Europe, India, Japan, Koria and the UK. At first sight, it would seem that ecocriticism has achieved global status. But as Ursula Heise remarks in her assessment of ecocriticism, this process of globalisation has been mainly a process of becoming known internationally. In truth, ecocriticism has remained strongly rooted in Anglophone literary studies even as it has been exported to …

Can Nature's Language Be Written, Spoken, And Heard? Mahasweta Devi's "Pterodactyl" And Marlene Nourbese Philip's Looking For Livingstone, Lori Martindale

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

How do traditional western epistemologies affect natures' subjectivity? This essay deconstructs the status of nature as silent Other. I argue Mahasweta Devi's The Pterodactyl and Marlene Nourbese Philip's epic Looking for Dr. Livingstone translate nature, or the radical Other, as subject. Scientific, xenophobic, and imperial behaviors have affected the status of natures' subjectivity in the naming, mapping, and exploitation of land, during colonial and commodity enterprise. As a result, nature’s language has become increasingly radical and is one to be translated for an awareness and avoidance of imposition; nature is a language yet to be understood.

Bird Watching: Global-Natural Worlds And The Popular Reception Of Winged Migration, Lisa Uddin

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

This paper examines the contemporary visual cultures of economic globalization and natural history by considering the popular French wildlife film, Winged Migration (dir. Perrin 2001). Through the small-scale of a single film's reception, the paper offers a critique of the Euro-American tendency to conceptualize the global world and the natural world in totalizing and mutually constitutive terms. How have images of a timeless and universal global world become a way of imagining the natural world, and vice versa? How has Winged Migration's circulation amongst an American popular audience reproduced, but also undermined, these joint constructions? Analyzing the film's central theme …

The World Is White And Slow And Infinitely Flat, Rob Baum

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Eco-feminism, cultural study and the environment coalesce in the form of poetic cultural commentary, originally fieldnotes. I draw exclusively from my years in the Alaskan Arctic among the Iñupiat Eskimo, who call themselves "the People of the Whale." The striking and severe natural environment, a landscape of endless ice, is central to the poetry, which richly portrays a vision of the Arctic absent from tourist travel guides, National Geographic and anthropological volumes. These magazines vend the Far North's beautiful austerity, including at times the physical beauty of its animal inhabitants, including humans, while disregarding human specificity and violence …

Tackling Biocomplexity With Meta-Models For Species Risk Assessment, Philip J. Nyhus, Robert C. Lacy, Francis R. Westley, Philip S. Miller, Harrie Harrie Vredenburg, Paul C. Paquet, John Pollak

Faculty Scholarship

We describe results of a multi-year effort to strengthen consideration of the human dimension into endangered species risk assessments and to strengthen research capacity to understand biodiversity risk assessment in the context of coupled human-natural systems. A core group of social and biological scientists have worked with a network of more than 50 individuals from four countries to develop a conceptual framework illustrating how human-mediated processes influence biological systems and to develop tools to gather, translate, and incorporate these data into existing simulation models. A central theme of our research focused on (1) the difficulties often encountered in identifying and …

Conceptualizing Wilderness Through Gis, Sarah Stevens

Undergraduate Research Symposium (UGRS)

The word “wilderness” in America is generally identified with pristine places where humans are not among the primary influences on the land and its ecology. The American wilderness ethic creates a strict dichotomy between humans and nature. The Wilderness Preservation Act of 1964 defines wilderness as “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain” (wilderness.net). This statutory definition of wilderness is essentially the functional embodiment of the American wilderness ethic. Wilderness can also be interpreted in ways that incorporate humans as active players in …

The Battle Over Our Land: Urbanization Versus Farmland Preservation In The Greater Golden Horseshoe, Kali Mikulica

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Urban sprawl continues to advance further and further into the countryside, as individuals trade cramped urban spaces for much larger rural lots and longer commutes to work. This increased sprawl permanently converts productive agricultural land to urban uses, especially in regions surrounding rapidly expanding cities. It is for this reason that farmland preservation has become a significant issue for policy officials in recent decades. According to the literature, there are numerous methods of protecting prime agricultural land in the face of urbanization; however there are few studies that focus on how these different policy techniques affect farmers. The Ontario government …

An Institutional Analysis Of Oil And Gas Sector Development And Environmental Management In The Yukon Territory, Jason C. May

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This thesis investigates the ways in which oil and gas development priorities and concern for the environment are integrated within strategic planning and management frameworks, and how associated conflict is addressed, in a case study of the Yukon. Because substantial ground-based oil and gas activity is yet to occur in the territory, a thorough understanding of the institutions and institutional arrangements set to govern future oil and gas development is a valuable tool for gauging the capacity to integrate these priorities. Therefore, this thesis employs the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework to analyze the legislation, regulations, policies, and institutions …

An Analytical Overview Of The Factors Influencing Housing Accessibility Of Bangladeshi Immigrants In Kitchener-Waterloo, Farzana Afreen Propa

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This study explores Bangladeshi immigrants’ settlement experiences in Kitchener-Waterloo (K-W) and alyses their housing history, housing search process, barriers and discrimination in accessing housing in the area. It reveals the factors that influence Bangladeshi immigrants housing accessibility in K-W. It also summarises recommendations to support and improve their housing situation. Qualitative research methods were used to collect and document the findings of the research.

The study findings reveal Bangladeshi immigrant households in K-W have comparaitvely higher levels of education compared to mainstream population and better employment condition compared to other Bangladeshi immigrants living in Toronto or Montreal. Many of these …

Model Estimation Of Land-Use Effects On Water Levels Of Northern Prairie Wetlands, Richard A. Voldseth, W.Carter Johnson, Tagir Gilmanov, Glenn R. Guntenspergen, Bruce V. Millett

Natural Resource Management Faculty Publications

Wetlands of the Prairie Pothole Region exist in a matrix of grassland dominated by intensive pastoral and cultivation agriculture. Recent conservation management has emphasized the conversion of cultivated farmland and degraded pastures to intact grassland to improve upland nesting habitat. The consequences of changes in land-use cover that alter watershed processes have not been evaluated relative to their effect on the water budgets and vegetation dynamics of associated wetlands. We simulated the effect of upland agricultural practices on the water budget and vegetation of a semipermanent prairie wetland by modifying a previously published mathematical model (WETSIM). Watershed cover/landuse practices were …

Geography's Place In Higher Education In Singapore, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Unlike the other papers in this symposium, which deal with countries where there are large numbers of universities, and comparison can be made over time and across space of geography's place in higher education, this paper focuses on a country that was for a long time described as a 'one-university town': Singapore. What interesting story call there be when geography's presence in higher education is so circumscribed? In this paper, the author illustrates how geography's,fate in higher education in Singapore is closely bound up with developments in other parts of the world, not unlike the way in which the country's …

Spatial Relationships Of Carbon Dioxide Exchange In An Upland Forested Wetland Complex In The Western Boreal Plain, Alberta, Canada, Danielle M. Solondz

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This study examined the midday (10:00 - 16:00) growing season (April - October) surface cover CO₂ relationships with different canopy closures and microtopography (lawn and depression) in a forested upland - peatland - pond complex in the Western Boreal Plain, north - central Alberta, Canada. A dynamic - closed chamber technique was used to: evaluate the relative contributions of heterotrophic and autotrophic respiration and photosynthesis and assess the relative roles of substrate, plant communities, hydrology, and microclimates on CO₂ exchange.

Large differences were observed among the forest floors of landscape units with different canopy covers with respect to …